Why simply garden when you can make the world your garden? The Rainforest Garden is all about taking a healthy dash of botanical style and incorporating it into your life through decorating, crafting, cooking and yes, even gardening.

My Illustrations

Make Living Arrangements with Houseplant Recipes

Thank you Southern Living!

The blog looks different, doesn't it? I'll cover that at the end of the post, but first I have some fun photos to share. Remember those neat rainforest drops that I made over a year ago? Here's an update on not only my own creations, but those of my good friends as well. Doreen Howard is the garden blogger for Old Farmer's Almanac who was kind enough to send me a progress report on a drop I sent her last year. Chris George is a fellow bromeliad addict with his own decidedly more exciting take on my recipe, complete with a blooming Vriesea bromeliad!

This is a Drop that I sent to Doreen Howard a while back. Doreen's Drop is brightening up the room with an assortment of Rhipsalis and Tillandsia. In spring she can expect to see a flush of new growth from the Rhipsalis, but until then it seems to be doing just fine dealing with the challenges of an indoor growing environment.

Chris George made his own drop with a modge podge of epiphytic cactus cuttings and tillandsia, and topped it off with a gorgeous Vriesea bromeliad. The toothed hanging cacti are Zygocactus, otherwise known as Christmas cactus. Can you imagine how they'd look in full bloom? He also incorporated a plant that I've been wanting to try out myself, resurrection fern. They act as a built in watering gauge, shriveling up during drought and returning with green lushness once thoroughly watered. They aren't offered in stores, but they grow wild on live oaks in the Coastal South. Don't harvest them from the wild though, just carefully remove one from a tree on your own (or a willing friend's) property after a rain.

My own favorite drop has filled in nicely after a year of once a week (roughly) waterings. It needed more water for the cuttings to establish, but now it thrives on neglect. I even found a bloom on one of the Rhipsalis over winter!

The 'Drunkards Dream' Hatiora isn't blooming yet, but one of my other 'Drunkard's Dreams' is. If those bright yellow orange blooms are any indication, we're in for a treat. I've even planted a Dendrobium Pierardii from my friend Grower Jim. Eventually the springtime blooms will drape over the edge of the drop in a cascade.

On a side note, you might notice some big changes in The Rainforest Garden's design. When I started the Rainforest Garden, the focus was strictly on "tropical gardening where it's not so tropical." Just as in gardens and many of the other good things in life, change is both inevitable and even welcome. Over the last few months, my work in illustration, photography and writing has come to dominate my life and creep into The Rainforest Garden, and you may have noticed less posts about tropicalesque gardening and more posts on creative projects like terrariums, drawing, containers and of course, rainforest drops. Will the blog posts change with the new design? Not much.

I saw a wild "rainforest drop" while in the Gunung Mulu national park in Borneo. It had obviously just started on the end of a hanging vine, when something stuck there and I suppose over the years nature added to it. Rather cool.

What a marvelous project! I have all the elements: grapevine, Christmas cacti, Epiphyllum cuttings, Resurrection fern, bromeliad babies. I just need long long-grain spaghnum moss. Wonder if Spanish moss could also be incorporated instead of small tillansias?

Now if I can just get my grapevine to curl into a ball shape.... Will it really matter when all the plants grow in if my ball is a little irregular?

I've been a fan of your blog for quite a while, and even though I'm from the (real) tropics, lots of your ideas give me inspiration in my garden too. I made 2 rainforest drops a couple of months back, one with Rhipsalis/Ceropegia woodii, & another with Dischidia. Both are doing really well & look lovely! I'll definitely be taking pictures of them soon, & posting them on my blog. Thanks for a great idea!

I can't wait to see your rainforest drops! Can you let me know when you post the pictures so I can have a little look? I've been growing dischidia lately and it seems to do well. Are you using cuttings?